John Milne
Main Page: John Milne (Liberal Democrat - Horsham)Department Debates - View all John Milne's debates with the Ministry of Justice
(1 day, 13 hours ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Mr Speaker
And if you had local magistrates courts—for example, in Chorley—it would help as well.
John Milne (Horsham) (LD)
I visited my local court just a few days ago. In Horsham, we are lucky enough to have a sufficient number of magistrates, but we still cannot maximise throughput because of a lack of support staff. In July last year, the Justice Committee reported that shortages of support staff were having significant impacts on delays and court capacity. What are the Government doing to attract younger people into the justice system, so that we can finally get to grips with this horrible court backlog?
Mr Lammy
The hon. Gentleman will be pleased to know that we are investing in more trainee legal advisers—108 in the last announcement. He is right: there are issues, particularly in the south-east, with being able to compete with the sorts of salaries that support staff might get beyond the courts. We are looking at that very closely.